"Oh, bliss, oh, rapture!" And the Admiral promptly says:
"Take her, sir, and mind you treat her kindly," and immediately, having fixed the ship's affairs so creditably, falls to bemoaning his sad and lonesome lot.
He declares that he "cannot live alone," and his cousin Hebe assures him she will never give up the ship; or rather that she never will desert him, unless of course she should discover that he, too, was changed in the cradle. This comforts everybody but the changed Captain. Ralph has, in the twinkling of an eye, become the Captain of the good ship _Pinafore_, while the Captain has become Ralph, and Ralph has taken the Captain's daughter. But while he is looking very downcast, Buttercup reminds him that she is there, and after regarding her tenderly for a moment, he decides that he has always loved his foster mother like a wife, and he says so:
I shall marry with a wife, In my humble rank of life, And you, my own, are she.
The crew is delighted. Everybody is happy. But the Captain adds, rashly:
I must wander to and fro, But wherever I may go I shall never be untrue to thee!
Whereupon the crew, which is very punctilious where the truth is concerned, cries:
"Well, hardly ever," the Captain says, qualifying the statement satisfactorily to his former crew. And now that all the facts and amenities of life have been duly recognized, the crew and Sir Joseph, Ralph and the former Captain, Josephine and Buttercup, all unite in singing frantically that they are an Englishman, for they themselves have said it, and it's greatly to their credit; and while you are laughing yourself to death at a great many ridiculous things which have taken place, the curtain comes down with a rush, and you wish they would do it again.
Giuseppe Verdi, born October 9, 1813, was the composer of twenty-six operas. His musical history may be divided into three periods, and in the last he approached Wagner in greatness, and frequently surpassed him in beauty of idea.
Wagner made both the libretti and the music of his operas, while Verdi took his opera stories from other authors. Both of these great men were born in the same year.
Of Verdi's early operas, "Ernani" was probably the best; then he entered upon the second period of his achievement as a composer, and the first work that marked the transition was "Rigoletto." The story was adapted from a drama of Hugo's, "Le Roi S'Amuse," and as the profligate character of its principal seemed too baldly to exploit the behaviour of Francis I, its production was suppressed. Then Verdi adjusted the matter by turning the character into the Duke of Mantua, and everybody was happy.